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Antique Style

This work in progress is the result of a combination of Ascension's, "Antique Style" tutorial and Tear's, "Saderan" tutorial, as well as a few "You Tube" tutorials by Zombie Nirvana. I've attempted to use Tear's elevations, mountains and hills to emulate a shaded relief look.

I have yet to label the geologic features so I haven't merged any of the text layers (from what I've seen, PS7 won't allow me to alter merged text so I've been holding off). I've given a few "city" names an outer glow just to see how it looks and I'll finish that after all of my other labels have been placed to make sure they don't overlap. It bothers me that I haven't included any lakes but I probably won't add them.

Map notes:

This map is for a sci-fantasy setting with low populations; it is based loosely on a map I drew in CC2.

Neutral Zones are the only international safe havens. Contested Territory, the Hot Zone in particular, are "free for all" areas even for people whose nations are not in a state of war. Most nations enforce a "closed borders" policy to foreigners.

I do like the shaded relief effect, reminds me of the atlases from grade school

I recall seeing this map before (earlier version in another thread) and thinking to myself that the borders were unusual - the only example I know of where a country is completely enclosed within a single other country is Lesotho surrounded by South Africa (does that even still exist like that?). But your explanations make a lot more sense for this map

Nice! And I can confirm that in ps7 the text layers will rasterize if you merge them. No smart object for that version. (no ability to group in folders either, owch)
I feel your pain

That looks really nice. I didn't go over it with a fine tooth comb but she looks done to me.

If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
-J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)

The only thing I can think of that might need a tweak is the lettering looks a bit fuzzy to me. With my already less than stellar eyesight I think it's the grey highlight behind the black letters that gives me the impression it has been blurred. I leaned towards my monitor as I was looking at this because of it.

I really like the style you have going on here and it does remind one of those popular globes. Good Work!

“When it’s over and you look in the mirror, did you do the best that you were capable of? If so, the score does not matter. But if you find that you did your best you were capable of, you will find it to your liking.” -John Wooden

Yeah, the Faux Bold thingy won't let ya warp text so what I do is to put a black stroke (or whatever color your text is) on it to fake a faux bold and still be able to warp it to a path. The caveat is that the fatter the stroke the rounder the pointy bits get so use a small stroke. Strokes also disrupt things like outer glow and drop shadow so if you are using those then duplicate the layer and put the stroke on its own.

If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
-J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)

Looks really good so far Mrrkyl. I was going to comment on the fuzziness of the font but then I read the other responses an looks like that's been covered. So I have not constructive feedback to offer, just a pat on the back.